The morning always felt so ethereal.
Light filled the office room, dawn was slowly approaching, so the light was in a soft yellow, colouring the sky with vibrant shades of orange, red, and pink. Outside the east facing window, one would see the distant spread of light on the horizon as the light moved from deep indigo, ushering in the morning. The light had not yet reached enough of the city for normal activity to begin.
There, across the empty streets of Arulli, the early morning people were already up and about. The only noise running through the city was that which came from the singing birds, whether the bird be animal, beast, or beast folk, as they started the morning singing soft relaxing notes. The brush of the early morning breeze felt refreshing, waking up those who were yawning the sleep away as they prepared to open up shop for the day.
The morning is so peaceful that one barely even feels the cold tinge of the morning air, sending shivers through those not yet fully dressed. It is hard not to appreciate the view of the lovely morning, especially from the top of the knight academy, inside the Grand Masters' office, where the Knight found itself today.
There was a birch desk, magnificent craftsmanship, and on the comfortable chair behind it, sat the most powerful human figure in the Order of Knights, Grand Master Juval the III.
"Please take a seat."
Zuri bowed and exited as the Knight sat in the chair facing the old man. It was strange to think of this man as old really, not because he was strong but because the Knight was centuries old, if not anything they were peers.
"I am Juval the III. You must be the Knight."
Of course he introduced himself, it's not like they knew that the Knight knew their names upon sight.
"Yes, that is me, I am the Vile Knight."
"May I ask why such an off-putting title?"
"To be as frank as need be, I don't think I quite know myself. It's just the title I have been awarded by the forces that be. I have long forgotten my name, so this is the only thing I have come to know."
He stood up and placed the book he was reading on the shelf. "You have a title, I know of just a few who do. Take pride my friend, as far as I have heard, all those who came to possess a title are the existences the world has identified. This has no real particular meaning.
Either you will change the world by the time you leave it, or you will just die, but it's just a privilege the world has decided to give those it has its eye on. I myself do not have one, as such I feel great. Having the eyes of the world upon you feels a tad bit overbearing."
He walked around the room, the light from the windows had become sharper, focusing the shadows across the floor, making them feel so familiar, like coming back home from a long journey.
"The book I just put down, do you know it?"
"Although I myself read much, I have not indulged in it for entertainment."
"Well, you should. The world is filled with so much more to live through. I used to think that life was short, even after growing over half a millennia. That is until I got into reading. I would live multiple lives when reading these books, making my single life seem much longer than I had thought it was."
"I will give it some thought."
Coming back to his seat, and turning it to face the outside, he said "This city always fills my heart with peace in the morning, that's the only reason I even accepted the top office.
The book I just read is from a well-known author, Ivil Ridee. She was tackling her own view on the numbness of power. There are multiple books on this subject, but I have always found that her view more interesting, even though she herself has not reached enough power to feel the numbness."
He was silent for a while, making the Knight realise that when Sir Juval walked, his armour made no noise. It was like it was part of his skin and even thought for the Knight, it really was like skin, it still made noise when it moved. For a human to achieve this level was really frightening. He continued after his brief pause.
"She starts from the past and how people viewed the adventurers and knights. First was the first few humans to unleash. It was terrifying, a boy with nothing but bones because of malnutrition, at level 1, could crush a seasoned body building professional.
They could crush tanks, becoming the most powerful ever humans. Humans normally had no power at all, they did not even register as level 0, of course that was until the researchers, during the first calm stages of the era of power began reading about it.
As it turns out, humans always had the potential for power, but until that day they had never really pursued it, thus the term changed from people growing powerful to people unleashing their power."
A Paige walked in, he had the Grand Masters newspapers in hand, the old man really enjoyed reading. He looked at the headlines and put it down, opting to finish the story before moving onto the news of the day.
"Then people became stronger and stronger, when the first human, one of the three, became level 5, she learned the first ever special skill, this made her even more formidable. Others could learn her skill, but no-one could do it as powerfully, and as easily as her.
This was right about when people began noticing the strange things about those who unleashed their power. Unleashing was no easy feat, but anyone could do it, after the process had been refined. For those who unleashed, they felt it was harder to relate to the other humans.
So, when the humans reached level 20, a brilliant man thought of creating an organisation, different from the Order of Knights, for those still at the lower levels to do jobs less focused on defence. He was not the first, but he was the one who came up with their ranking system."
"What had he accomplished? I don't think ranking people is a feat worthy of being marked down in history."
He looked away from the window, took a glance at the Knight, and returned to the view, it was already early morning, the stars had all vanished. "The thing is that people had noticed that people really were growing powerfully out of hand, this made it harder for them to rap themselves around the levels, which is when this man decided to start grouping people.
The most powerful person at the time was level 34, the hero Eruil. Thus, he decided to group people on a whim, starting with those ranging from level 31 to level 40, which was hypothesised to exist. He had hoped that humans would peak at level 100, so the rankings were G-rank, 31-40, F-rank, 41-50, E-rank, 51-60, D-rank, 61-70, C-rank, 71-80, B-rank, 81-90, and finally the highest rank, A-rank, 91-100."
He drank the beverage on his table; the Knight signalled him that there was no need. "Think about it, no-one had reached level 40 yet, so all those were just pipe dreams. The thing is that long after that man was dead, the world had its first A-rank. This was right about when powers started emerging along with the first of the other species. Most races had all their ancestors begin at S-rank. The people could learn a power, how they discovered this is still unknown, but it had killed 90% of all those who tried.
Power was strange, if one conforms to it, they physically, mentally, and spiritually change, but if one does not give in to it fully, they become powerful whilst remaining human. It was a prideful time for the world, change and power was spreading. This was strange though, at level 101, what could they even call him? That was when the guild masters of that time, agreed to call him S-rank, for 101-110.
Wishing to increase the ranking system, they added SS-rank, 111-120, then came SSS-rank, 121-130. That was when the people started coming up with the titles at level 131-140, became known as legendary rank, 141-150, became heroic rank, then everyone from level 151-200 were known as just gods, because these were as strong as the mythical gods of stories, moving seas, mountains, and the world. As you can see now, humans have long surpassed what qualified as a god. The humans then grew tired of this system of ranks, because someone always broke it, just like the first level 201."
"What does this have to do with the numbness of power though?"
"Everything. This is because without the ranking system, humans would have never grown to realise just how preposterous it all was. Without seeing the limits broken many times over, humanity would have never noticed just how far it had become.
At first, I could only read a chapter a day, then next I was reading 10 a day, then it went on like that. Without the initial limit, I would have never realised the changes in my reading pace. This is when the title god, for those at level 150-200, started making sense, these humans all lived over hundreds of thousands of years easy, only dying in battle. The theory was first established around that time.
'The stronger one gets the more they get poisoned.'
As they saw it power was like poison ivy, one touches it and it starts making them itch. Becoming a god was also a mental change, some better off than others. The itch got stronger the more they touched it, at the higher levels those people were no longer the people they once were, they weren't even people. This is how the purge era began."
The Knight was seeing it, unlike it, which was no human, thus power had a limited effect on it, but humans had all these factors, emotions, relations, situations in life. They used to be at the bottom of the power chain, not anymore, powers had first been witnessed from beings above level 100.
"They would sometimes even become detached from humans, going on killing sprees. That was when the first monsters emerged, the destroyers had always existed. Being the initial catalyst, they were what the knights had to fight against, but monsters were something else.
Driven mad by power they became the abominations that run rampant across the Ouran (name of the planet). One day they all just started accumulating in dungeons, thus giving the world some reprieve. The numbness of power always comes differently, the worst case was it turning people to monsters, there are other ways to become a monster, but this is how they all began. The other side-effect of the numbness of power is the change in character, which can be fun, like some of the childish knight Bannerettes.
But in some severe cases the change in character births those like the dark knights, who see the world as their playground, and them as its sovereigns. Another example would be the cloud folk, each of them is convinced they are the gods who supervene upon the world, you should see Zues."
After saying that he laughed, then paused and looked at the Knight. "The thing is that to prevent this, the knights need to make sure, that before revealing the secret to unlocking the second seal and more, they needed to be sure, that the numbness of power will not turn you into a narcistic savage, and to be pretty honest you look like you would give in to such delusions once power has run through you.
People cannot handle power, it is not something anyone should get, but not everyone is so malleable, that is why I have decided you are strong enough, where it counts, to not be affected by the numbness of power."
"What gave you that impression?"
"The travellers coming from Maroon city. Each and every single last one of them is convinced you are a hero. Heroes have been scarce for a long time, and even I am not sure that you are not one, but if you managed to convince a whole city that you are one, with the looks you have, no offence, then there must be a beating heart somewhere in there."
'Damn hero skill, I am still not accepting it. But now at least that constant bombardment of hopes is not so bothersome, it's still distracting though.'
"This is why I want you to be a Knight Bachelor."
The Knight was leaving the office when the old man added, "Also most of what I told you is classified, only a Knight bachelor and above has access to it in the Archives.
So, I do suggest some level of caution with your words when in company of those of lower rank. Some of this information is from the house of mother, exercise some prevarication."
The Knight would have gained five knowledge levels from this conversation, but with it being capped at level 250, the Knight had not. The Knight really had to unleash its seal, otherwise all this knowledge would go to waste.
The will of wisdom was different from that possessed by humans, as such their knowledge about how to unleash their seal was useless to the Knight, and the Knight's own method to unleash was more problematic because its will.